The outrage in Ferguson is understandable—though there is never an excuse for rioting or looting. There is a legitimate role for the police to keep the peace, but there should be a difference between a police response and a military response.

The images and scenes we continue to see in Ferguson resemble war more than traditional police action. …

Most police officers are good cops and good people. It is an unquestionably difficult job, especially in the current circumstances.

There is a systemic problem with today’s law enforcement.

Not surprisingly, big government has been at the heart of the problem. Washington has incentivized the militarization of local police precincts by using federal dollars to help municipal governments build what are essentially small armies—where police departments compete to acquire military gear that goes far beyond what most of Americans think of as law enforcement.

Why armored vehicles in a Midwestern inner suburb? Why would cops wear camouflage gear against a terrain patterned by convenience stores and beauty parlors? Why are the authorities in Ferguson, Mo. so given to quasi-martial crowd control methods (such as bans on walking on the street) and, per the reporting of Riverfront Times, the firing of tear gas at people in their own yards? (“ ‘This my property!’ he shouted, prompting police to fire a tear gas canister directly at his face.”) Why would someone identifying himself as an 82nd Airborne Army veteran, observing the Ferguson police scene, comment that “We rolled lighter than that in an actual warzone”?

The thug police in St. Louis County arrested two reporters, likely illegally, and have been telling the press (and presumably citizens) that they don’t have the right to film them (the cops) — which is absolutely untrue.

Look at these photos comparing scenes in Ferguson with similar scenes in Iraq and Afghanistan. We have militarized our police. The rioters were wrong, and have no excuse. Still, the far greater disgrace, and the far greater menace, was the police response. When you have even law-and-order conservatives protesting it, you know the cops have gone too far. RedState’s Erick Erickson told the NYT:

“The natural reaction of conservatives, I think, has always been in defense of law and order.”

But lately, he added, there has been an awakening among many on the right. Many see an increasingly disproportionate response to crime as a sign of a larger problem that should rattle the consciences of conservatives who are wary of centralized authority, he said.

“As more and more people become aware of how overcriminalized the law and regulatory system of the United States is, they become aware of just how easily it is for them to be carted off to jail for innocuous behavior,” Mr. Erickson said. “That necessarily increases distrust of the system over all.”

As a very conservative friend of mine put it on my Facebook feed last night, “Law and order does not mean the police get to do whatever they want.”

UPDATE: Reader Ken Snyder has some good perspective:

I was a police officer for more than sixteen years, and I was the founder and first commander of our local Emergency Response Team in a small town in mid Michigan. I would echo those who say that most law enforcement officers are committed, dedicated people trying to do their best when dealing with very difficult situations. And I am not passing judgement, nor am I condoning, the activities of the Ferguson police in this series of events.

The larger issue is that police culture has changed and become more paramilitary in the last 15-20 years. There are two factors to this that I don’t hear discussed often. The first is 9/11. There were many people who believed that these attacks were only the first of what would be frequent and localized terrorist attacks in our country(think Beslan in Russia). Local police were encouraged to train and equip themselves for this, which is also partly why the feds began distributing military equipment to local law enforcement agencies. The second factor is the focus on mass shootings, and in particular, school shootings. Although they are relatively rare, preparation for response to them has been a focus of law enforcement since Columbine (although statistics show that law enforcement officers only stop these killers in about 1/3 of mass shooting incidents).
These events have caused law enforcement to change training and tactics, as highly trained teams like ERT and SWAT teams often cannot get to incidents like mass shootings in time. Therefore, individual officers have to be trained and equipped like SWAT, and they take on that same mindset.

But the important point is that I think this is what we citizens wanted. We want the police to be ready and able to deal with terrorists and active shooters. So these are the police that we want, but only in very specific situations. So citizens are shocked to see that equipment and, if not tactics, that same mindset applied in situations like Ferguson, and the many examples that are shared across web sites and local media. But once the police have this equipment, training, and mindset, as a practical matter, the citizens of a particular community don’t get to decide when they utilize it. We leave that up to the ‘experts’ who have ‘all of the information’. I think in some ways this is just another facet of the ongoing discussion in our country about NSA spying, etc: we want security, but at what price?

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166 Responses to The Disgrace Of Ferguson

“The homicide rate among black americans isn’t an order of magnitude higher than among whites, the illegitimacy rate isn’t 70%, the high school dropout rate 50%, and incarceration rate 33%, because white guys aren’t sensitive to systemic racism.”

This is just the kind of silliness that stems from being distracted. And leads to the type of hijacking I am talking. Out of wedlock births, the black homicide rate have absolutely nothing to do with this issue – none. And my comments have nothing to do with white insensitivity. White sensitivity has absolutely nothing to do with justice. of course empathy would be nice — but that is a so what.

It’s like the shoplifting/robbery nonsense. Neither the shop owner or clerk called the police. They never filed a charge — whatever went down they didn’t think it was worth the effort based on comments the store owners lawyer. And most importantly, the young man who was killed was not stopped because of that incident. So the debate concerning that event was wholly beside the point, even to the suggestion that the physical contact at that location is indicative that a young black man upon being stopped is going to assault armed officer. The plausibility is the question.

Sen. Paul and others however, are not examining the real issue. That everything we hear in this incident is just par for the course regarding stopping black men in general. As if suddenly a black man went from raising his voice, from walking down the street and became a wild animal eager to beat up police officers. That is the motif, that is the narrative which plays well and is much tougher to dissect because it is laden with 200 years of dominant narrative used to control blacks. So ingrained in white thinking is it — that it is the white default. Black men are wild animals, dangerous – and the bigger they are the more dangerous the more one needs to subdue them. But what is stunning is the volumes of research data which lay out just what I describe. If Sen. Paul had said, ok, I have finally have a enough. What is being said, has been said by black communities across the nation is not only oddly reflective of what we see today, but is contained in volumes of scholarly research, I would applaud the stance. But hearing that from someone who wants to grant Israel a carte blanche ticket — smacks of something problematic.

Where do you think these tactics are coming from (rhetorical)? One need not read a book to understand the tactics used by the Israelis. The idea that the gentleman or the lady attempting to position themselves for the WH have any real sense of what they are doing is completely naïve or sinister.

“We are all in this together. Bad cops victimize white folks too. The city I grew up in had the worst police force in Michigan per a state police study in the 80s. Their outrages were many, and I suffered a very minor one myself once (a cop who pulled me over for speeding when I was 18 tried to pick a fight with me which would have “justified” beating me up and tossing me in a jail, a standard little trick these cops pulled). At the deadly level, they shot an unarmed 16 year old (white, middle class) kid during a road rage incident.”

First, I don’t get the impression from blacks I know, despite how few I Know currently, that they believe for one minute we are al in this together. We have never been in this together save when whites have seen opportunity to use their struggle for some other end. Say, killing children in the womb, burning bras, have same relations with men so grotesque and bankrupt is the use that the liberals have actually contended that Dr./Rev. Martin Luther King would be so marching. I can understand why after the Vietnam misstep. But I think I am safe in saying, blacks will politely agree with the sentiment, but the are quite aware that whites have no intention of being in their shoes.

The country doesn’t look like we are all in this together. I have to reject the notion.

Sad to say M_Young, I mean on the street strip searches, entirely visible to people on nearby porches, and even cavity searches on the street (which aren’t supposed to be done by police officers at all, only be licensed medical personnel). Some officers have been fired, some even imprisoned, and several are losing lawsuits, as is the city.

First, I don’t get the impression from blacks I know, despite how few I Know currently, that they believe for one minute we are al in this together.

People can believe that the Earth is the center of the universe, e pur si muove.

Look around the blogosphere– there’s plenty of criticism and condemnation coming from white people, even many on the Right. I’ve been pretty nice about it here, but on the Atlantic and Mother Jones and Bloomberg I’ve been ranting with the best of them about the idiocy of the Ferguson police– and reminding the racist trolls that even if the kid did steal some cigars, we do not have a death penalty from theft.

I also fail to see anything self-serving about my comment. The events I cited from my home town were real– I did not make them up. Bad cops are bad cops, and everyone suffers from them.
(FYI, I live in a very integrated neighborhood, in a majority black city with a black mayor, and one where crime is hardly unknown. I am not pontificating on high from the confines of some gated lily white mcmansionville. Oh well, as St Augustine told the refusenik British Christians, if you don’t want peace with your friends, you will have war with your enemies)

I suppose EliteCommInc, who often writes sensibly, is trying to be the good white person who understands where black people are coming from even though he doesn’t know many.

I know quite a few. I happen to live and work with people who don’t share my skin color, so I’ve had many years of opportunity to observe how and why we are all in it together, and how and why there are cultural differences which could easily set us apart.

The truth is, there are SOME black men who would physically confront a police officer at any opportunity, and others who would not. The latter know that the former exist. The latter resent that many police officers can’t tell the difference, or don’t care, and the former make use of this as cover — been doing it for years. There are many hard working, church going people who really don’t like the incidence of gun shots in their neighborhoods, who would be happy to see effective police work root that out, but on the other hand, do not appreciate the distinct possibility that police will burst into THEIR peaceful quiet homes without notice on some spurious tip, backed by the notion that ‘we can’t tell the law abiding citizens from the criminals because they’re all black.’

Its a complex muddle, and until we get a higher standard of competent, professional, precise, police work, which recognizes consistently that black criminals is not a basis to target all black people, any more than white criminals are a reason to target all white people, we will continue to have incidents that are very difficult to deal with rationally.

(Police are making some progress, in some times and places. It really is better than fifty years ago. But its not good enough.)

In many ways, we are all in it together, whether it feels that way or not, whether we like it or not, but if this is pointed out in a sufficiently patronizing manner, it will be rejected by people who don’t want to hear it.

“It’s like the shoplifting/robbery nonsense. Neither the shop owner or clerk called the police. They never filed a charge — whatever went down they didn’t think it was worth the effort based on comments the store owners lawyer. ”

“New Stooge needs to go, and the National Guard needs to come in.”
Cap’n Ron was happy to escalate the situation with curfews and tear gas and rubber bullets––in return he got the inevitable gunfire and firebombs––and now you have gotten your wish and the Nat’l Guard is guarding the state police’s Unified Command Center, since they’ve observed that the rioters are actually becoming organized and mounting planned attacks (indeed, the very ‘non-spontaneity’ of the storming of the Unified Command Center was enough to delegitimate the revolt in the eyes of the state––only unplanned, disorganized expressions of outrage are permitted in public protest, organized self-defense is ‘criminal’).

“Look around the blogosphere– there’s plenty of criticism and condemnation coming from white people, even many on the Right.”

I am not sure that is applicable to the discussion. Sure, there are whites who are very disturbed by events. No doubt. History is replete with whites who so entertain. But my comments go, first, specifically to those who are advancing anything but the issue at hand, i.e. militarization of the police. In some general scheme, it may be pertinent. But it does it get the immediate question in Ferguson. Distracting from that is in my view part of the problem for blacks.

whether or not one wants to reduce or remove minimum mandatory sentences is all quite nice, but hardly a solution to endemic policies. Merely removing such sentences does not address the issue that even without them blacks have on this issue been unfairly subject, that is my opinion. But I think the data will bear it out – I think it does. Self serving in my view because it has all of the right tone of concern, which let’s one off the hook, but hardly gets to the issue of preventing in justice in the system or at the very least reducing it. It is not my intention to merely sound harsh or dismissive merely to provoke comment. Sen. Paul may very well have a genuine concern about the criminal justice system – there is plenty to be concerned about. And it is not a liberal concern. In other words, this not about me having a bleeding heart for blacks. It is one of the few social problems that can be linked historically with some consistency as well as explanations beyond, lazy, unintelligent, impulsive blacks.

Look, as I stated, blacks may be very generous on sentiments. And in spite of your neighborhood, I am not sure if one looks at the data that the evidence would support that we as a society have been in this together. Hence, the problem and it is not isolated. I don’t think you get the community response based on one incident.
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“More likely free of reprisal if they ‘snitched’.”

That really is not the point. That it was used to blur the issue at hand is. To distract, to turn the focus on unrelated event and character.

As for not snitching — the police are experts at not snitching. Far more adept than those under suspicion, interrogation, coercion (warranted or not). I have no idea if they were intimidated. Lots of store owners probably don’t report petty theft – hassle — cost against gain.

But irrelevant.
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Laughing. I won’t be scoring any points with black people. Most blacks who know my views on drug use – sales, unwed parenthood, welfare and any score of liberal advances, including the current WH executive would guffaw at the notion.

As for church, I was sad that you made the reference. Whether or not one chooses to attend a church or not is inconsequential, except that among whites, it suggests a level of safety– of good black – a common motif in our society. Church going is the high mark of security. Part of the white narrative.

Ah, the ever so effective loaded, “confront”. You would have to explain what that means. Confrontation has so many dynamics. But to invoke it here, I suspect is loaded with all manner of communicative import, “violent, angry, animal, out of control (impulse control), etc.” I have worked in black communities, and some blacks, will confront, but few if any will attack an officer for a mere stop or even after being provoked. most blacks are just most people around cops — cautious. But in all y time in the city, I have never seen a police officer be attacked by a black man. And tat time was most intensely spent in KC, Mo. a city in which tensions between white officers and blacks was very high. Now if you mean question an officers right to do such and such, complain about it, swear about — it happens. If that is what is meant by confrontation, I think some might be applicable. But short of that — rare is probably more accurate and I have already acknowledge that such cases would be in play. But blacks even those involved in criminal activity are not likely to attack the police. I have come to believe your suggestion is part of an old but effective cliche’. Backs hate police so much that they seek any opportunity to attack them — that is really what you mean by confront, in my view. I say, the evidence is pretty shrift, except in the all too common refrain in police reports.

In fact, your entire response is textbook cliche’ narrative with the following code words: confront, hard working (black) church people, shootings, crashing into homes — all invoking the dangerous black man motif.

So allow me to make it clear. I am not talking about drug bust or gang activity. Introducing that here seems inappropriate.
I felt the same way about Trayvon Martin.

And I think I have already acknowledged that there are black people who certainly need to be in jail, but tat is a case circumstance.

The yoke of color of black people is very very thick and it will take more than better police training to work it out.

And just for the record, I think it is possible to be an angry, loud back person and never intend on attacking a police officer. For conservatives, we ought to be overly concerned tat there is overwhelming evidence of artificially created disparity. And that disparity has nothing to do with same sex marriage, free love, abortion, etc.
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While I am at it, as I have been deliberately avoiding posting as much as I have over the past several weeks, I should address the data posited earlier.

No the drop out and graduation rates for blacks and whites is pretty much the same. More blacks graduate from HS than end up in prison.

The actual poverty rate is about 33% among the black population, but I sometimes confuse that with those receiving welfare.

The homicide rate is dropping across the board as it is with most populations. And while one is pressed into conceding there is no direct link to poverty and crime, one has to acknowledge the correlations and that within such environments some manner of relationships are under greater stress based on the relations – particular city environments, city life entails far more riskier options and for those with the fewest opportunist, the higher risk offers the highest reward — perhaps. Poverty is not excuse for murder or other criminal behavior, but if someone told me it did not increase the tension — I would have to say bunk. Further the social mechanisms for addressing such issues have not been resent in inner city communities until recently, if I recall.

trust me a lot of black people think my positions on my issues and lifestyle are bunk. In many respects they are the enemy by their choice to see my politics as some kind of war against them. I chagrin the period in which the Republican lost or dumped the black vote. Part of my import is that I am increasingly suspicious of the move to import foreign workers.

And the single biggest killer of blacks in the US is the murder of their children in the womb. That reality should shock every black person.

Note: I am not unsympathetic to the desire to fight back against tactics such the store video used to muddy the waters. The state, the government, has too much power and the way it yields to shortcut culpability has ben tragic for many Americans, and blacks in particular.

Nothing stops Sen. Paul from being in solidarity with that. And as a conservative — every conservative should be as concerned as I am that effective governance is first excised on the most vulnerable.

Celibacy and Christianity are personal choices and are certainly not in any sense political issues. I’m not sure what you mean by “scripture”– the argument as to what books are canonical? Literal vs typological interpretations? But that’s a discussion within the Church, not for the larger society. I am also not sure what you mean “male female relations in their proper order”; that also seems like something people should be working out in their private lives not in the public square. As for capitalism it never seems to be practiced properly, but of course that may just be Original Sin. Vietnam has not been an issue in this country since I was in grade school; it’s odd to see it mentioned as any sort of contemporary issue.
That leaves abortion, capital punishment and homosexuality, and the latter as you specifically phrase it doesn’t belong in the public square either (though, yes, SSM definitely is).

Actually, Brown paid for the cigars– as can be seen now that more than just a few stills have been released from the video; money can be seen changing hands at the cash register. He then got into a dispute with the store owner about something (there’s no audio so we can’t tell what was said), lost his temper and, yes, shoved the guy on the way out. That’s why the store did not call the police- there was no theft. Brown was a rude jerk. We do not shoot people for that, though I’m sure we’ve all felt like it.

Whoa. “Celibacy and Christianity are personal choices and are certainly not in any sense political issues. I’m not sure what you mean by “scripture”– the argument as to what books are canonical?”

Those are issues about which there is little room for compromise — my general frame. I was intending to start or waylay the discussion. Excuse me. I think I was saying something about me. Perhaps as it pertains to my a priori view on those issues.

All issues that enter the public arena with references of explaining or moving a social or socio-political agenda can certainly be part of public discussion. Everyone of those issues has been openly part of the discourse on this site.

I see value in the evolving alliance between Left and Right on foreign affairs. But the corresponding result relative to Ferguson, MO is much less satisfying–and a great deal more curious.

Clearly, the suspicion of police, the central state, Authority–I will call it the Tea Party Effect–has made conservatives (at least the TAC variety) surprisingly–even startlingly–sympathetic to the oppressed underclass in places like St Louis, as well as oddly in harmony with the likes of Al Sharpton and other high masters of 24/7 grievance litigation.

This is not an entirely bad thing–and electorally may indeed be wise. But soon enough young Mr. Brown will be found to have savagely beaten the arresting officer and, if not deserved, then at least precipitated his own undoing. Since the newfound conservative sympathy for the looters, rioters and more energetic protesters is premised on the gross overreaction of a hyper-militarized police force that is as much a threat to the white community as to the black and Latino, the almost certain revelation that all too typical inner city thuggery lit the flames in Ferguson may well weaken the position of those who prefer to see this as above all a narrative of Leviathan crushing individual freedom–albeit freedom with its its boxer shorts showing.

Once again, the awkward romancing of Left and Right may turn out to be a wonderful thing–I just hope that TAC doesn’t wind up joining hands and hearts with the Weather Underground, or including Danny the Red as one of its bloggers. Strained bedfellows indeed!

“Since the newfound conservative sympathy for the looters, rioters and more energetic protesters is premised on the gross overreaction of a hyper-militarized police force that is as much a threat to the white community as to the black and Latino, the almost certain revelation that all too typical inner city thuggery lit . . .”

There are two problems here:

1. I think there is sympathy over what may be a symptom of an ethic in which the state operates inequitably with blacks. A sympathy for their frustration ad anger — the young man was unarmed. Is the tip of a some other deep rooted issues. That is a far cry from sympathetic to looting and thuggery.

2. This issue is not about a militarized police force. It is about treatment and relations that appear to have been breeding before armored cars and CFV;s rolling into driveways. And the suggestion that white people are as much at threat is bizarre.

I live in a white community. Last week as I was packing a shipment for repairs in the garage – a huge hollow bang went off down the street just after a flash. My first thought was it was a shogun. My housemate fled into the house. And being incredibly dumb, stepped but onto the drive way to get a better look. I moved to protect — idiocy. Perhaps, someone had lost it was shooting anyone outside — I had better look see — lunacy. Or perhaps, some fed up wife had done her husband in. The sound was really, really loud — but when I saw no one and my housemate returned to reassure her I said it was probably a M80 set off by some kids. Like a single ‘flash bang’. I kept a wary eye wondering if one of us should call the police.

As it happened two patrol cars pulled up and parked along side the house – one in front of our house and the other down in front of the house next to ours. Officers could be seen moving down the hill, which I thought odd — because the sound came from down the intersecting street as did the flash. After a bit a sole female officer strolled up the drive. After some niceties, “What can I do for you officer.” She tentatively asked if we had heard some noise. My response was the M80 option. She said ok and went on her way. I thought it was strange no cars went down the street, it was a bit irritating in fact. It would seem prudent to cruise the neighborhood.

The point of this recollection is this. If that same thing had occurred in the predominantly black neighborhood — say where I worked in KC, Mo. The entire neighborhood would have been lit end to with flashing lights and probing flashlights. I won’t discuss the residual impacts of such incidents on property values and economy.

The suggestion that whites are as at threat as blacks is body slammed by the data. And to be sure, I have no illusions that my comments will ingratiate me with blacks. Most of whom think celibacy is a cover for being on the ‘down lo’. But at least your comments grants that blacks are risk and at one time more at risk than whites , even in your understanding.